RD

The Print Jungle

‘In the jungle one has to defend oneself as best one can.’ This is the experience of a militant in the printing industry where, after a succession of take-overs, the monopoly confronts the worker with its ‘rational’ demands for modernizution and closures. From the shop floor the irrationality is obvious: the monopoly’s use of scientific advance does not benefit society, does not advance man. Instead, desperate situations of insecurity, under-employment and redundancy are created. rd, aged 51, has been a militant since he joined the Communist Party in his youth. A Spanish Civil War veteran, a former Imperial Father of the Chapel (convenor) and a committeeman of the London Central Branch of the Society of Graphical and Allied Trades among his other union activities, he here describes 18 years experience of the printing trade.